Israel's foreign minister said Wednesday there was no reason to assume the Mossad assassinated a Hamas military commander in Dubai, even as suspicions mounted that the country's vaunted spy agency made the hit using the identities of Israelis with European passports.

An 11-member hit squad carrying European passports was responsible for killing a Hamas commander in his hotel room last month in a slaying that has brought vows of revenge from the Palestinian militant group, Dubai's police chief said Monday.

Ariel Sharon, the tough army general turned premier who shocked his hawkish supporters by pulling Israel out of Gaza in 2005, is still lying unconscious in a hospital bed, friends said Sunday on the fourth anniversary of the massive stroke that put him in a coma.

Israeli soldiers stormed homes in the West Bank on Saturday, killing three Palestinians suspected in the fatal shooting of an Israeli and testing an uneasy security arrangement with Palestinian authorities.

Hamas leaders raced to Egypt on Monday amid signs of progress on a deal to swap hundreds of Palestinian prisoners for a captive Israeli soldier held by the Islamic militant group for more than three years.